by admin | Apr 19, 2020 | Relationship Goals, Sermon Audio and Notes
17 Now when Jesus came, he found that Lazarus had already been in the tomb four days. 18 Bethany was near Jerusalem, about two miles off, 19 and many of the Jews had come to Martha and Mary to console them concerning their brother. 20 So when Martha heard that Jesus was coming, she went and met him, but Mary remained seated in the house. 21 Martha said to Jesus, “Lord, if you had been here, my brother would not have died. 22 But even now I know that whatever you ask from God, God will give you.” 23 Jesus said to her, “Your brother will rise again.” 24 Martha said to him, “I know that he will rise again in the resurrection on the last day.” 25 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life. Whoever believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, 26 and everyone who lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?” 27 She said to him, “Yes, Lord; I believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, who is coming into the world.”
John 11:17-27
Jesus is no longer in the grave. “He is Risen! He is Risen, indeed, alleluia!” church communities around the world chorus together to celebrate that truth every Easter Sunday. But do we live as if this is true? Are our lives changed by the actual true fact that Jesus was crucified and has been raised from the dead? Pastor Yami challenges us to recognize that if Jesus is truly no longer in the grave, we must live differently.
Next Step Questions:
- What do you believe about the resurrection of Jesus?
- How does your life demonstrate the truth of the reusurrection?
by admin | Apr 5, 2020 | Relationship Goals, Sermon Audio and Notes
21 As they approached Jerusalem and came to Bethphage on the Mount of Olives, Jesus sent two disciples, 2 saying to them, “Go to the village ahead of you, and at once you will find a donkey tied there, with her colt by her. Untie them and bring them to me. 3 If anyone says anything to you, say that the Lord needs them, and he will send them right away.”
4 This took place to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet:
5 “Say to Daughter Zion, “See, your king comes to you, gentle and riding on a donkey, and on a colt, the foal of a donkey.’”
6 The disciples went and did as Jesus had instructed them. 7 They brought the donkey and the colt and placed their cloaks on them for Jesus to sit on. 8 A very large crowd spread their cloaks on the road, while others cut branches from the trees and spread them on the road. 9 The crowds that went ahead of him and those that followed shouted, “Hosanna to the Son of David!” “Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord!” “Hosanna in the highest heaven!”
10 When Jesus entered Jerusalem, the whole city was stirred and asked, “Who is this?” 11 The crowds answered, “This is Jesus, the prophet from Nazareth in Galilee.”
Matthew 21:1-11
Prepare him room, the Christmas song sings; prepare room for the king, Diana Nkhoma instructs us on this Palm Sunday of 2020. In this time where many of us are separated from each other when we would normally gather in crowds and processions mimicking the gathering in Jerusalem, Diana invites us to recognize that this might be time for us to prepare room for Jesus not in a city but in our own hearts. In this sermon she helps us to identify the different voices in the crowd surrounding Jesus as proceeded through Jerusalem on his way, ultimately, to the cross at the end of the week. Where are WE among those voices, she asks? We must take stock of where we are and how we relate to this Jesus, as the first step along the way to prepare room for the king.
Hosanna, hosanna, hosanna in the highest!
Next Step Questions:
- Where are you in the crowd that was praising Jesus?
- How do you need to prepare him room in your heart?
- What is the invitation that Jesus is giving you as a response to where you are at?
by admin | Mar 29, 2020 | Relationship Goals, Sermon Audio and Notes
13 So now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; but the greatest of these is love.
1 Corinthians 13:13
For our second week meeting online as a church, Andee Cooper Parks helps us to repackage 1 Corinthians 13 and the Relationship Goals series into one cohesive whole: the Flood Blantyre Love Curriculum. As a founding member of the church and our executive strategist for 4 years, Andee knows the heart of Flood through and through. In this sermon, she reveals that heart and weaves the core tenants of Flood Blantyre into 1 Corinthians 13 to develop this love curriculum. What must we do? Love neighbor, love ourselves, love the earth, love God.
Next Steps:
- Be kind and patient; share real facts about COVID-19
- Ask: how can you love your neighbor, yourself, the earth, and God in this time?
- Ask: which “course” in the curriculum do you need to grow in right now?
About the series: the reality of life is there is no life apart from relationships. Your relationships might be with stuff, not people, but your life is relating itself to STUFF. So our heart and our goal in this series is to just be at a place where we ask the hard questions, we get into the space of trying to understand what is love really like. Now when you get into scripture, scripture has a lot of stuff to say about love. So we are are looking at some few amazing things that God has said in his word in 1 Corinthians chapter 13 of what love is.”
Catch up on earlier Relationship Goals sermons: Week 1 , Week 2, Week 3, Week 4, Week 5, Week 7, Week 8, Week 9, Week 10, Week 11, Week 12
by admin | Mar 24, 2020 | Relationship Goals, Sermon Audio and Notes
14 “Let not your hearts be troubled. Believe in God; believe also in me. 2 In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 3 And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also.
John 14:1-3
6 do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God.
Philippians 4:6
33 I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.”
John 16:33
With the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, it is hard to say really live in Jesus’s command: “do not be troubled.” We have so much to think about, as people, as brothers, sisters, wives, mothers, hubands, fathers, colleagues, bosses, teachers, students, as Christians. Join us this week as we take our church service online for the first time with Dr. John Parks giving us an informative overview of the Coronavirus while also keeping it light and making us laugh. Pastor Yami takes up the baton from there and reminds us that in this world we will have trouble, but Christ assures us that he has overcome the world. Do not be troubled or anxious, take heart!
Before jumping into the scripture, Pastor Yami spends sometime going over 10 basic instincts that cause us to react incorrectly to the world, based on the research of Dr. Ron Gosling. In his book, Factfulness, Dr. Gosling draws attention to the fact that our perceptions of the world are often wrong, distorted by 10 specific and identifiable instincts. Pastor Yami briefly discusses these instincts and how they are being put on display by our global and local responses to the spread of the coronavirus. To love each other well during this crisis, we need to learn to adjust our perceptions and be aware of these instincts at play in our lives. The good news we come to in the end, though, is that even if our human instincts are off base, Christ is carrying and comforting us. Let us bind together to learn to love God and love our neighbors in new and creative ways in a time of prohibited gathering, banned physical contact, and rampant fear.
Next Steps:
- Be kind and patient; share real facts about COVID-19
- Life up your troubles to Jesus; pray to Jesus in faith
- Serve others
About the series: the reality of life is there is no life apart from relationships. Your relationships might be with stuff, not people, but your life is relating itself to STUFF. So our heart and our goal in this series is to just be at a place where we ask the hard questions, we get into the space of trying to understand what is love really like. Now when you get into scripture, scripture has a lot of stuff to say about love. So we are are looking at some few amazing things that God has said in his word in 1 Corinthians chapter 13 of what love is.”
Catch up on earlier Relationship Goals sermons: Week 1 , Week 2, Week 3, Week 4, Week 5, Week 7, Week 8, Week 9, Week 10, Week 11
by admin | Mar 19, 2020 | Relationship Goals, Sermon Audio and Notes
9 For we know in part and we prophesy in part. 10 But when that which is perfect has come, then that which is in part will be done away. 11 When I was a child, I spoke as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child; but when I became a man, I put away childish things. 12 For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part, but then I shall know just as I also am known.
1 Corinthians 13:8-12
“There is a tension that exists between the reality of the kingdom of God, the presence of the Holy Spirit, and the realities of the broken world we live in,” Zack says in his introduction to the 11th week of Relationship Goals. This tension is the “already but not yet” of the Kingdom, which is ultimately what the Apostle Paul is talking about in this middle section of 1 Corinthians 13. We live in the promise, given spiritual gifts and love to work in the world while we wait for its fulfillment in the return of Jesus. That’s right, the world we live in right now–all its joys and all its pains, all its struggles and all its celebrations–are only temporary.
For now, in the already but not yet, we have received the Kingdom of God but we, as the scripture says, know only in part. Zack takes a brief moment to discuss the importance and value of spiritual gifts as Paul speaks to them here, but in this sermon we spend most of our time on the mystery of the arrived and yet still coming kingdom.
The Kingdom of God entered into the present reality of our earth when Jesus was born as a man, lived, taught, loved, died, and rose again. This is the reality that is the “already.” Through the power of the Holy Spirit, Jesus freed people from demons, healed sickness, and conquered the uncontrollable forces of nature. The Holy Spirit empowers miraculous things to continue to happen today. And yet, the world remains full of pain, strife, and brokenness. This is the reality that is the “not yet.” We exist within this tension. The invitation is this sermon is to recognize the tension, but then to recognize and embrace the promise of scripture that this tension will not last forever. “We know that when He appears we shall be like Him,” we read from 1 John 3:1-2, “because we shall see Him just as He is.” When He appears. When the perfect comes. These are assured moments in the future that we must look forward to in order to continue to live and move and breathe within the tension of the already but not yet.
Next Steps:
- Remember that we live in the tension and frustration of the “already but not yet.”
- Sit with the Lord and ask, “What are some childish ways in me that need put away?”
- How does the “Age to Come” affect my relationships in this “Present Age?”
- As we continue to look forward to Easter – what’s one thing you can do to see Jesus more clearly? (Jump into the Lent devotional on the YouVersion App: Preparing our Hearts for Easter)
The reality of life is there is no life apart from relationships. Your relationships might be with stuff, not people, but your life is relating itself to STUFF. So our heart and our goal in this series is to just be at a place where we ask the hard questions, we get into the space of trying to understand what is love really like. Now when you get into scripture, scripture has a lot of stuff to say about love. So we are are looking at some few amazing things that God has said in his word in 1 Corinthians chapter 13 of what love is.
Catch up on earlier Relationship Goals sermons: Week 1 , Week 2, Week 3, Week 4, Week 5, Week 7, Week 8, Week 9, week 10
by admin | Mar 12, 2020 | Relationship Goals, Sermon Audio and Notes
4 Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant 5 or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; 6 it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. 7 Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
1 Corinthians 13:4-7
In the 10th week of Relationship Goals, we return to 1 Corinthians 13:7, where Paul says that “love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, and endures all things.” As we touched on how love bears and believes last week, Pastor Yami took us to hope and endurance this week. “Figuring out where you get your hope will completely change how you endure,” Pastor Yami tells us toward the beginning of the sermon. This sermon then proceeds through a look at the everyday language of “hope.” When we say we hope for something in casual conversation, we’re really just naming our wishful thinking, our desire for something to happen. What we hope for reveals our desires and it also reveals our fears. And at the end of the day, we usually expect our hopes to be fulfilled by something tangible–more often than not, our own ability to work things out as we plan them.
To hope in a Biblical way, however, is to stake our confidence on the character of God. Biblical hope does not hang on crossed fingers, fend off the terror of the ‘what ifs,’ or see our present through the lens of what we can expect to accomplish. Biblical hope is “confident expectation and desire for something good in the future,” rooted in the promises of God. He promises to work all things, ALL THINGS, for the good of those who love him. He promises a future day where there will be no more pain or suffering. He promises us rest. In Jesus, our true hope, the work of the enemy–all the pain of this world–is undone. In Jesus, our true hope, our eternity is secured. In Jesus, our true hope, we have a real and ever lasting friend. This is our hope: a future assured in the goodness of God. And in this, we can indeed endure all things.
Next Steps:
- What have you allowed to be the root of your hope – when that place belongs to God alone?
- Where are you downcast?
- What truth (repeated truth) do you need to live out to be more of who Jesus wants you to be?
- What has God said, that you are refusing to believe in, for your situation?
The reality of life is there is no life apart from relationships. Your relationships might be with stuff, not people, but your life is relating itself to STUFF. So our heart and our goal in this series is to just be at a place where we ask the hard questions, we get into the space of trying to understand what is love really like. Now when you get into scripture, scripture has a lot of stuff to say about love. So we are are looking at some few amazing things that God has said in his word in 1 Corinthians chapter 13 of what love is.
Catch up on earlier Relationship Goals sermons: Week 1 , Week 2, Week 3, Week 4, Week 5, Week 7, Week 8, Week 9
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